September 28th is his birthday, which is also "Teacher's Day" in Asia.
Today, I would like to share one of my favorite sayings from the great Chinese philosophers -- Confucius 孔子. There is a famous collection of his teachings called 論語 pronounced as Lunyu, known as the Analects of Confucius which was compiled by his students over 50 years after his death in 479 B.C.
I am actually a big fan of Confucius. In my 6 years of middle school, I was forced to memorize many things that were completely useless and meaningless, but I always enjoyed memorizing chapters from Lunyu. His philosophies of life are full of wisdom and kindness, and I find myself coming back to these lessons from time to time.
This is a saying about Friendship that I like --
子曰：“益者三友，損者三友。友直，友諒，友多聞，益矣。友便辟，友善柔，友便佞，損矣。”
There are 3 types of good friends: one that is direct and honest when they think you are wrong; one that is trust-worthy, dependable, and generous when you need help; and one that is knowledgable and talented to guide you and show you what you can't see.
There are also 3 types of bad friends: one that would lie to you because they don't want you to dislike them; one that is nice to you but is not sincere at all; and one that likes to talk a lot but does not have any substance.
Here is a link to Confucius Quotes to get a flavor of his wisdom.
Today is also a very important friend's birthday and I want to wish her happiness and health. Su and I went to elementary school together and she has been all 3 of those good friends to me. If you read Chinese, visit her blog and you will understand how lucky I am to call her a friend.
6 comments:
The face on the statue is not an accurate representation of him.
dear Alice
Thank you so much!
You are also the friend with three good characters of
mine!
I have a wonderful birthday today~
To Anonymous -- I tried very hard to look for a more eye-pleasing picture or graphic of Confucius. You are right, the picture I posted may not be accurate, but is certainly the image I have in my mind. :)
you are a good friend!
PS. I feel so sad that I can't even pronounce some of those chinese words anymore.
Chloe, so nice to see you here. Well, I can't really pronounce all of those characters with confidence, either. haha.
Hi, my name is Pablo and I am doing a research paper on the life of Confucius. I used your site as a reference and am now doing the works cited page and was wondering if you could tell me your real name since the name that you use in this site is Wonderland Alice.
Thanks, Pablo
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